Lady Catherine's Necklace (19 page)

‘I always travel with them,' said Lady Catherine placidly. ‘And also, you see, I did not wholly trust that young man who is staying in my house. Your nephew, you say he is? Well, as you must already know, he is a decidedly ramshackle character. His zeal in promoting my plan to take this trip to the West Country seemed somewhat odd to me at the time – I wondered then if it could be my diamonds he was after. So I left the false ones behind, those I always keep for second-class occasions. Naturally, then, I had no inkling of this preposterous plot hatched between him and my brother and my nephew FitzWilliam –
prank,
forsooth! Well, they shall all feel the consequences in my will.'

Trelawny had told Lady Catherine how he was offered payment in a letter from Lord Luke to meet the coach in Brinmouth and transfer its drugged passenger to the Greens' farm, where she would be kept incommunicado for a week or so. But the scheme had fallen disastrously apart, with the accident to the coach and the death of Hoskins. What became of the coachman was unknown. He had presumably recovered consciousness at some point, and staggered on down into Brinmouth, where he may well have been swept away in the flood in which many others perished.

‘Speaking of wills,' said Trelawny, who had walked down into the shattered town to see if there was a newspaper to be had and to visit his friend the doctor, ‘talking of wills, ma'am, I must tell ye that your purposed visit to your sister the Duchess of Anglesea will be a waste of time – that is, if ye were still reckoning to make it? The duchess died five days ago, Dr Lantyan told me. I grieve to have to bring you this news.'

‘Adelaide was not my sister, only my sister-in-law,' Lady Catherine calmly explained. ‘Married to my brother James.
He
won't greatly grieve at her loss, I dare say. He is off in Spain, losing one regiment after another, by all accounts. And Adelaide, a most difficult, cantankerous woman, had chosen to immure herself down at Great Morran. Well, I only hope that she has not made a shockingly injudicious will. The prime object of my visit was, if possible, to prevent such an outcome. She had an immense fortune settled on her by her own father – I trust she has not left it all to a home for superannuated female harpists.'

‘No, not that. I was going to tell ye: her attorney told Lantyan that she has left a large portion of her fortune to a nephew, Granville FitzWilliam.'

‘Oh,' said Lady Catherine very thoughtfully, ‘
has
she, indeed? I fear that will materially reduce my daughter Anne's chance of getting married. Without the inducement of a fortune, there will be little hope of persuading FitzWilliam – good-natured and obliging though he is – to take the wretched girl. Nor am I sure that I would wish him to. This disgraceful affair has materially lowered him in my estimation. Does your friend the doctor have any information as to when the funeral will be held, and where?'

‘Yes, ma'am. It will be at the duke's principal home in Somerset, Zoyland Abbey, in ten days or so, when he has returned from the peninsula.'

‘Then,' said Lady Catherine, sighing, ‘I had best bestir myself, now that you and I are both on the mend, and write home for some money and clothes suitable for the obsequies. Heigh-ho! It has been so pleasant staying here, free from care; I have enjoyed my conversations with you, my good friend. How disconcerted they will be, at home, to know that I am still in the land of the living. And you, how glad you will be to resume your peaceful solitary existence of meditation and recollection.'

‘Not entirely, ma'am. I too have valued our exchanges. When, if ever, I bring out my volume of recollections and recaptured verses, I should like, if you have no objection, to take the liberty of dedicating it to you.'

‘Certainly. I shall be gratified – honoured, indeed.' Surreptitiously, Lady Catherine touched her eyes with a handkerchief.

Letter from Lady Catherine de Bourgh to Miss Pronkum

Trevose Farm, Brinton, Cornwall

My good Pronkum,

My present direction is this farm, which lies due south of the port of Brinmouth. Pray bring me clothes suitable for a funeral (my black satin, the jet-trimmed turban, the black mantilla, etc.), besides one or two walking costumes and two or three evening gowns. Also a hundred pounds in ready cash. Do not attempt to pass through Brinmouth town, which has suffered severely from flooding, but take the back roads from Truro. I shall be attending the Duchess of Anglesea's funeral at Zoyland some time next week. You may inform Lord Luke and Col. Fitz-William that I have met Mr Delaval's uncle, Mr Trelawny. After the funeral I shall return to Kent.

Catherine de Bourgh

Maria was playing to herself on the organ of Hunsford church. More and more often, latterly, she had availed herself of this solitary distraction. The atmosphere at the parsonage, these days, was anxious and fretful; and at Wormwood End she was almost always liable to encounter Mr Delaval. ‘I do not greatly care for Mr D.,' she had written to Mrs Jennings, and she had not since then found any particular reason to alter that opinion. ‘Oh, dear, dear Mrs Jennings, how very much I miss you,' thought Maria, playing a mournful air by Gluck. ‘Writing to you seemed to clarify my thoughts.' And the prevailing mood up at Rosings House was strange indeed. Still no news of Lady Catherine; the colonel plainly deeply worried; Lord Luke utterly absorbed in some documents he had discovered with the help of Joss and Anne de Bourgh. Anne herself, who had hitherto appeared to despise her uncle and hold him at a very low estimate, had now completely changed her attitude and seemed to regard Lord Luke with a kind of amused affectionate awe, ‘As one might,' thought Maria, ‘regard a sparrow that suddenly began to chirp out the sonnets of Shakespeare.'

Sighing, Maria shuffled her music together and prepared to return to the parsonage.

In the church porch she found Colonel FitzWilliam.

She had intended to pass him by with a cool and brief ‘Good morning', but he detained her.

‘Miss Lucas – Miss Maria—'

His tone was humble, almost supplicating.

‘What is it, Colonel FitzWilliam?'

It was not in the nature of Maria Lucas to be unkind. The gentleness of her voice could be interpreted as solicitude and goodwill, and Colonel FitzWilliam did so interpret it. He said:

‘Miss Lucas, my dearest Maria – for dearest you must always be to me, despite all the wrong and tragic events that have fallen in our way – during these last weeks I have come to understand more and more clearly how sorely I need you. I have come to believe that I cannot do without you. Deep and bitter conviction makes me tell you this. I know that I have not the shadow of a right to claim your goodwill, but my need for you overrides my duty to others, my awareness of the wrong I have done to others. I am not a bad man, Miss Maria, I believe I have it in me to be a good one, if you were by my side. If you would only accept and guide me, I believe it would lead to great happiness for both of us. We – we should not have very much to live on, but now, I believe, that is of little importance.'

He looked at her beseechingly.

Maria took a long, deep breath. Then she said:

‘Colonel FitzWilliam, you truly astound me. What of your duty to Miss Anne de Bourgh? Are you not promised to her?'

‘Yes, yes,' he said impatiently, ‘but that is only a packthread tie, the merest breath would break it. I will not malign my cousin Anne at this time, but I believe she has plans of her own which do not include me.'

‘This puzzles and shocks me more than a little, Colonel, for I have not been able to help observing that, though betrothed to your cousin, you have been paying what seemed unmistakable attentions to another lady, Miss Delaval.'

He flushed and said shortly, ‘You must also have observed that Miss Delaval is the sort of woman who expects as her right those little attentions, encouragements and services which mean nothing to both parties, but are merely the regular material of social dealing. Anybody who reads more than
that
into my relation with Miss Delaval makes a grievous mistake.'

‘I think
you
make a mistake there, Colonel FitzWilliam. I think the lady has read a great deal more into your connection with her than you admit; I think what you call the regular material of social dealing may have led to harm and mischief. As—' Maria stopped and swallowed.

Colonel FitzWilliam broke in.

‘No, no, there I am sure you are wrong. I am sure, I – I hope so. Miss Delaval is a well-bred, accomplished, easy-spoken lady who has been about the world and does not – does not wear her heart on her sleeve. I am sure you are wrong,' he repeated eagerly.

‘But that is not the end of what I have to say, Colonel,' Maria doggedly continued.

‘Remember last summer!' he pleaded.

‘I do remember it.' Involuntarily Maria laid a hand upon her heart as if to quiet a sudden pang. ‘I did love you then. I do not deny it. But – we grow, and we change, Colonel. I have grown, I think. And I have changed. I looked up to you last summer; I did not know you as well then as I know you now. Events have taken place – strange, dreadful things have happened. They may have changed you. They have certainly changed me. I fear I do not feel towards you now as I did then. I – I have different plans. I—'

She swallowed, thinking of Mrs Jennings's legacy, about which she had told nobody. What would the colonel say if he knew of that? Would he back away in horror, believing that she took him for a fortune-hunter? She could almost have laughed, looking up at his melancholy, hangdog, craggy face.

‘I am sorry,' she said flatly. ‘But there is no future for us together, Colonel FitzWilliam. And I think there is no more to be said on this subject. So – I bid you goodbye!'

She turned, and almost ran across the churchyard.

Did I do right, Mrs Jennings? ‘Now
don't,
' Mrs Jennings had urged her, ‘don't you go into Kent thinking you've got to find a husband there. I want you
so
to have a husband, as you can't think, but it's not got to be just
any
husband, mind! Both my girls have got decent, good men they can rely on, and that's what I want for you, my dearie! So don't you take the first that offers, if he don't suit, but come you back and stay a month or two with me in London and look about you, and first and foremost,
don't be in a hurry!
There's plenty fish in the sea. Besides which, there's more things in a girl's life than husbands. There's your music, for instance. Remember a husband is not the be-all and end-all.'

Which is certainly true, thought Maria, considering her sister Charlotte, who had her children, her house, her garden, her poultry – and Mr Collins.

Her recollection of Mr Collins was perhaps prompted by the sight of Mr Collins himself, red-faced and panting, hastening at a highly incautious pace along the lane that skirted Rosings Park between the mansion and the parsonage.

‘News, great news!' he shouted as soon as he saw Maria. ‘Most prodigious, most excellent news! Lady Catherine has been heard from at last! And she will soon be on her way home!'

*   *   *

Anne had persuaded her Uncle Luke out into the little fountain courtyard, where he was pacing to and fro, reciting his ‘Ode to Orpheus':

‘When Orpheus plays upon his lyre

Seated beside his snowy fire

Where the clear, pear-shaped flames arise

To meet the dark and starry skies

And frosty sparkles deck the trees

And all the tumbling torrents freeze,

A troop of skipping colonels dance

With many a neat and sprightly prance

Kicking the snow in misty flurry

Each thinking of his dish of curry

Bald heads and glistening eyebrows white

On each moustache a stalactite…'

‘Oh, Uncle Luke, I do love it. It is so preposterous! What made you
think
of these things?'

‘They just tumbled out, my dear. Like the torrents. Of course, everybody I showed them to told me they were sad stuff. Even your dear mother was quite captivated by them at first, but then after I was sent off to Eton – I went to school very late, you know, because I was of a delicate constitution, my old trouble, you know – Catherine and I became, as it were, separated. She learned to despise my Lassarto “plays” as we called them; she condemned them as childish rubbish.' He rubbed his eyes. ‘There was a shocking scene … For me, that was a grievous wound. I felt betrayed; but also I lost confidence in my own imaginings. It is a terrible thing to despise yourself,' Lord Luke said thoughtfully. ‘I did that for many years. And then, up there in Wensleydale, I do not know how or why – perhaps it was the conversation of young Delaval, whom I met at Bingley's house—'

‘Delaval?'
Anne's voice was full of disgust and astonishment.

‘Oh, I know, my dear. He is a sadly flibbertigibbet young fellow, there's no denying that. But then, so am I! But he has a lively mind, a lively, exploring, questing mind, especially when he has taken a glass or two – I dare say he has never put forth his whole intelligence, displayed his real wit to you.'

‘Indeed he has not! He considers me a boring little dowd.'

‘Ah, pity, pity … He is a man for other men, it seems, not for females. Well, as I said, up there at Wensleydale I began to hanker more and more for my lost writings. I felt – foolish as it may seem to you – that if only I could be reunited with them, it might, as it were, open that vein again, touch off the hidden spring, make me a new start. I knew Catherine would
never
allow me access to them – supposing she even knew where they were, if they were even
there.
No: my only recourse was to go about my scheme by stealth. And only see how successful
that
has proved!'